Mayor Sean Lynch in Baldwin Market. (Washington Post photo by Antonia Farzan) |
Baldwin, in Duval County (Wikipedia) |
Lynch said the city isn't trying to make a profit, but if the market is profitable, the money will go back into improving the city. A few other towns have done the same thing, with good results. "Notably, these experiments in communal ownership are taking place in deep-red parts of the country where the word 'socialism' is anathema," Farzan reports. And a collectively owned, government-run operation like Baldwin Market is socialist by definition. "But in many rural, conservative communities struggling to hang on to their remaining residents, ideological arguments about the role of government tend to be cast aside as grocery stores shutter because of population decline and competition from superstores."
Many small towns are struggling to attract new residents, and not having a grocery store can be a deal-breaker. So "food access becomes almost like a utility that you have to have for the town to exist," said David Procter, director of the Rural Grocery Initiative at Kansas State University. Lynch thinks along the same lines. "We take the water out of the ground and we pump it to your house and charge you," Lynch told Farzan. "So what’s the difference with a grocery store?"
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